The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) Regional Office for the Middle East and North Africa (ROMENA) supports disaster response and preparedness activities in 20 countries by working closely with Humanitarian Coordinator’s (HC)/Resident Coordinator’s (RC) offices, OCHA Country Offices and Humanitarian Advisory Teams (HATs).

Convened under the Presidency of Fiji, the 2017 UN Climate Change Conference of Parties (COP) will make history as the first-ever small island state COP. The negotiations will take place from 6 to 17 November at the World Conference Center in Bonn.

To support the ambitions of the Paris Agreement, the Bank Group is ramping up action around key focus areas such as mobilizing climate finance and supporting vulnerable countries to build resilience to climate impacts.

Prospects for global cereal production in 2016 continued to improve in recent months with significant upward revisions for maize and wheat, reflecting particularly favourable weather conditions in some of the large producing countries.

COUNTRIES IN NEED OF EXTERNAL ASSISTANCE: FAO estimates that 36 countries, including 28 in Africa, are in need of external assistance for food. Persisting conflicts and drought induced production declines are the main causes that have stressed food security in 2016.

Emergency aid and reconstruction measures supported by Switzerland directly benefit around three and a half million people a year.
Given their scale and tragic consequences, Swiss Humanitarian Aid has focused its attention on the conflicts in Syria and Iraq, South Sudan and the Central African Republic, and the Ebola epidemic in West Africa. (p. 8)

Food insecurity spreads as El Niño casts its shadow over Pacific and Caribbean states

2 June 2016, Rome - Drought linked to El Niño and civil conflict have pushed the number of countries currently in need of external food assistance up to 37 from 34 in March, according to a new FAO report.

9 March 2016, Rome - Thirty-four countries, including 27 in Africa, are currently in need of external assistance for food due to drought, flooding and civil conflicts, according to a new edition of FAO's Crop Prospects and Food Situation report released today.

The 2014 International Annual Report of SOS Children's Villages, published today, presents risk factors for family breakdown and positive impacts of family strengthening, along with programme statistics and financial results.

In 2014, SOS Children’s Villages International provided sustained care for more than 439,000 children, young people and adults through its Family Strengthening and Family Based Care programmes.

The U.S. expanded its aerial campaign against Islamic State (IS) militants in late September with strikes in Syria’s north and east. The operation, which targets both IS and fighters linked to al-Qaeda’s central leadership and the affiliated group Jabhat al-Nusra, risks alienating other rebel groups in Syria and strengthening support for IS.

In conformity with the instructions by HM King Mohammed VI and as part of Morocco's active solidarity with friendly countries of the CARICOM, Morocco decided to send humanitarian aid for Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, St. Lucia and the Commonwealth of Dominica which were hit lately by intense rainfall that caused important damages.

Description: The State of Environmental Migration 2011 is the second of an annual series, which aims to provide the reader with regularly-updated assessments on the changing nature and dynamics of environmental migration throughout the world. Written by students of the Paris School of International Affairs (PSIA) of Sciences Po, this volume's case studies analyze the migration flows that were induced by some of the most dramatic events of 2011—both sudden disasters and slow-onset events. IDDRI and IOM have initiated, supervised and edited the volume.

This week, flooding caused by heavy rains affected more than 1.3 million people in Nigeria. Flooding
also affected more than five million people in Sindh, Balochistan and Punjab in Pakistan and around
226,000 in Bogra State in Bangladesh. A heavy tropical cyclone hit the south-west coast of Bangladesh
on 11th October 2012 displacing 20,000 people and affecting more than 100,000. Armed violence
continued to escalate in Syria with heavy fighting occurring in Homs, Daraa, Deir Ezzor, Idlib, Latakia,
Aleppo and Damascus.

World food stocks to rise, but hunger risks persist in Sahel, Near East

Food security worsening in Syria, Yemen, amid unrest, says FAO

Rome, 13 June 2012 - FAO's quarterly forecast of agricultural production and food security gives an overall positive outlook for cereal production worldwide, but warns that several regions of the world are expected to struggle with the consequences of poor rainfall, severe weather, armed conflict and displacement.

GENEVA/CAIRO, 28 February 2012 - Morocco is taking steps to join 78 other nations whose governments have created National Platforms for Disaster Risk Reduction to support policies for building resilience to disasters.

"The future National Platform will help the work of all sectors to converge into one common objective, which is to construct a country that is safer for current and future generations," said Mehdi Chalabi, Director of Surveillance and Prevention of Risk at the Department of Environment.

The desert locust (SGR 1 ) situation remained relatively calm in most of Sahel West Africa and northern Africa in September due to poor rainfall. Only limited breeding occurred during this period and isolated adults were reported in northeast Morocco. Good rains were reported in northern Chad and western lowlands in Eritrea where ecological conditions are expected to improve and small-scale breeding will likely begin.